East Coast fisheries regulators voted Wednesday to reduce the take of menhaden by nearly 40 percent — a victory for environmental activists and recreational fishing allies who contend the oily, herring-like fish have been harvested to levels below what is healthy for the ocean ecosystem.
The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission voted in Boston for new biological benchmarks that in time would push a 37 percent reduction in the fishery — a move activists aim squarely at Omega Protein, a Houston-based company that is the sole operator in the industrial fishery that processes menhaden for fish meal and oil.
Omega’s boats have been pushed out of near-shore waters after years of state-level legislative campaigns by recreational fishing advocates, who complained about big purse seine nets cleaning out large schools and leaving little to feed prized sport fish like striped bass and bluefish.
“Almost every economically important predator fish on the East Coast … target on menhaden,” said Terry Gibson, a recreational charter captain and writer from Jensen Beach, Fla.
Over time, Omega’s Reedsville, Va., processing plant has come to rely more on fish caught within Chesapeake Bay and in federal waters beyond three miles of the beaches. The fisheries commission imposed a cap on the Chesapeake catch several years ago.
The Pew Environment Group poured a lot of resources into campaigning for new controls on the industrial fishery, marshaling 90,000 letters to the commission from supporters.
Read the full article at the Asbury Park Press.
Analysis: The article underestimates the health of the menhaden fishery, claiming that it has been fished to "levels below what is healthy for the ocean ecosystem" and "pehaps 10 percent of its onetime size." Such claims are misleading and are not accurately reflected in the scientific data, as the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission concluded in its last assessment that menhaden were not overfished. Similarly, the claim that menhaden are at 10 percent of their historic level is misleading. The figure refers to the Maximum Spawning Potential (MSP) which is an estimate of a theoretical unfished population, and not a historical measurement. Menhaden are currently fished to around 10 percent of MSP, but that alone is not an indication of overfishing; MSP has historically rarely risen above 10 percent, with the population previously able to rebuild itself at that level. Over the past several decades, there has been little correlation between MSP levels and menhaden recruitment.